


a second wish

by SparrowPixie



Category: The Daevabad Trilogy - S. A. Chakraborty
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, City of Brass - Freeform, Danarhi, F/M, I wish this too could be happy dammit, Just a one off I wrote for fun, What I hoped was gonna happen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-09-20
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:40:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26565967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SparrowPixie/pseuds/SparrowPixie
Summary: An alternate ending to City of Brass where Dara and Nahri escape
Relationships: Darayavahoush e-Afshin/Nahri e-Nahid
Comments: 2
Kudos: 4





	a second wish

**Author's Note:**

  * For [astarisms](https://archiveofourown.org/users/astarisms/gifts), [littlethiefs](https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlethiefs/gifts).



> When I first read City of Brass and they were on that dang lake I was praying that this would be the ending and boy was I mistaken AF - Anyway, here’s a happy little wish fulfillment fanfic

_“I wouldn’t do that, sand fly.”_

Dara put Nahri behind him, he felt himself pale as Alizayd continued towards them. 

This was not the “Little Zaydi” he had fought that day in palace. This was someone else. Someone darker. Some _thing_.

Dara reached for his bow in response to the prince steadily approaching them, rusting scimitar in hand. He would not kill Nahri. He only wanted Dara. As inhuman as Ali appeared Dara recognized the look of a man out for blood.

Dara tried to blink away the tears clouding his vision. From Ali’s lips came a slithering tongue that Dara had never heard. He quickly glanced at Nahri who was watching the prince in horror, her mouth agape. She would not die by his hand. He would protect her. Dara was her Afshin.

As Dara aimed his bow at Ali, he felt whatever passed for a heart in his chest pound against his ribs. 

“Dara,” Nahri said.

“Run!” Dara released an arrow.

It dissolved on contact with Ali. A shiver ran down his spine.

“Dara, I wish for you to get us out of here! I wish for you to take us away! Now!”

Dara choked, his vision blurring. His hands, his feet, his mind were not his own. Something smacked him in the stomach. Rough but soft. His hands flattened over it and it stiffened. Magic surged through him, he felt weightless and the last sound he heard was the loud thud of metal cutting into wood. A sword stabbing into the deck of the ship perhaps? 

It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. Dara knew nothing of what was happening in this moment. He did not care. He knew that he should but he couldn’t. It was the same feeling as when Nahri had wished that he would not be harmed. It felt familiar beyond that even. Like an old enemy. 

Could Nahri be…

The world suddenly came back into view. Dara had to blink to bring the picture into focus. He was sitting, leaning back on an elbow, the night sky just above him. The stars shining overhead. Looking to his right he saw Nahri, her face streaked with tears. He panted, trying to catch his breath, his expression puzzled.

When he looked to his left he saw beneath them the Gozan. _Far_ beneath them.

Looking down at his legs, Dara realized they were sitting atop a banner, a tapestry from the ship they’d just been on. They were fleeing Daevabad, flying through the night sky once again. 

The events that had transpired only moments ago flooded Dara’s memory, fully restoring him and making him present once more. Then a wave of exhaustion hit him like karkadan. The last thing he heard was Nahri’s startled sob, then he collapsed back onto the tapestry.

Sunlight filtered through the leaves, shining on Dara’s face and waking him from his slumber. He squinted and shielded his eyes from the sun, then slowly pushed himself to sit up. 

He was beneath a small spattering of trees and as he sat up, he could only see miles and miles of desert. It was familiar. It was… the place where he’d first stopped with Nahri. Where they had their first _real_ conversation and saw Khayzur. How strange that this should be where Nahri’s wish had taken them.

The wish.

Nahri.

Dara gasped and looked around him for his Banu Nahida. Instead all he saw was a small fire that crackled and fizzled, the embers within starting to die. He suspected Nahri had made it for him, likely recalling the last time he had been almost devoured by a rukh and had begged for one. 

And then had she left?

_“You will not forgive me the boy.”_

And so she hadn’t. She had left him here with only a fire and the tapestry they’d flown to this place on for company. It was what he deserved and with a gruff growl he realized that the Qahtanis had won. Again. 

The Banu Nahida despised him. They’d made him a monster before her and the illusion of _her_ Dara - the man she’d proposed to - was gone. Replaced with The Scourge. 

Damn the emir. Damn whatever that prince Alizayd had become. Dara had lost her. She had been all he had. All that he wanted. 

He was alone once more.

Dara’s throat felt thick, his stomach as though it were filled with lead. He had to find her. She was still not safe. Even if it meant not speaking to her, being a shadow, he could assure Nahri’s safety. He would. So it was time to start searching.

Setting his jaw, Dara pushed himself to stand. He staggered slightly, trying to gain his footing on the sandy plain.

“Dara, lie back down.”

Dara jumped in alarm at the feeling of a delicate hand steadying his shoulder. He glanced behind him and there she was. His Banu Nahida.

Her hair was in a wild array of curls, her skin flushed and her lips dry and chapped. Her dark eyes were tired but still very aware beneath her furrowed brows. 

She looked him up and down and offered a sad sort of smile. “Don’t make me _wish_ for you to sit.”

Dara let out a drowsy laugh that was equal parts relief, amusement and delirium.

Bracing both of her careful hands on his shoulders, Nahri slowly lowered him to sit back down. For all his muscles and hard work, he felt weak with her fingers on him. He felt as though he were made of air.

“The blackness is fading, but I can still see it on you,” she muttered. “I need you to get your strength back.”

Trembling, Dara watched as Nahri shifted on her knees to face the fire. A flame sparked from her palm igniting the small fire once again. She scooted backwards on the tapestry then gestured for Dara to get closer. He obeyed silently.

“It fades faster when you’re by the fire.”

“The blackness?” Dara asked hoarsely.

“I see it mostly on people who are ill. It’s more of a shadow. It was all over you yesterday morning when we finally landed here,” Nahri said, prodding at the fire with a stick. “I think you used too much magic that night.”

“How long have I been unconscious?” he hedged.

“Two days.”

Two days. Two days of her caring for him in this desert. Two days with nothing to eat or drink. Dara was instantly alarmed, his head pounded.

“Afshin,” Nahri said quietly. “You wouldn’t happen to have the strength to conjure some water, would you?”

Dara nodded and closed his eyes, focusing what little strength he had to summon a water skin to his open palm. He would do anything she asked. No arguments. No exceptions. 

She had come with him. In spite of all that had happened she had held him fast and told him that it didn’t matter.

There was a faint ringing in his ears but sure enough, the cool weight of a water skin was in his hand. He thrust it at Nahri who accepted gratefully.

“Drink it slowly,” Dara cautioned, massaging the bridge of his nose.

She waved him off and took slow, steady gulps of the water. He prayed it would last her until he could conjure her more. Until he could summon more. Whatever he had done to get them out of Daevabad had exhausted him and left him feeble. 

What _had_ happened? All he remembered was coming to from her first wish. Her wish that he would be safe only to find Jamshid riddled with arrows and Muntadhir mourning his fallen brother and lover, hurling insults.

“Nahri,” Dara croaked, hesitant to even breach the topic. “What did I do?”

She averted her gaze, lowering the water skin and wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. She extended it to him. Dara shook his head. Why was she so reluctant to answer him? 

He arched a brow. “Nahri, you commanded me to take us away. What-“

“I had to, Dara,” she said, her voice fierce. “I had to get us out of there before you started a fight you couldn’t finish. There was no other way.”

Dara shook his head, confused and concerned at the distress in her dark eyes. Did she think he was angry with her? For using his magic to save him - _twice?_

He saw her gaze flicker to the slave marks that wound up his arm and back, the rungs seemingly endless. Did she… fear him? 

But how couldn’t she? He had become someone else on that ship. He could vaguely recall his actions but they had not been his own. Her wish had moved his arms and legs.

Oh, but her _wish_ hadn’t responded to Muntadhir’s taunting. It hadn’t made him transform his khanjar into a scourge. It hadn’t made him shriek at the emir and spit things he couldn’t take back. Things that she couldn’t unhear. Like threatening to scourge Muntadhir bloody.

“Well? Do you have anything to say?” Nahri said, her voice strong but trembling.

“Nahri, I will not harm you. Tell me you know that…”

“I _had_ to command you. I had no other choice.”

Dara flinched at the word. _Command_. So many had commanded him. Greedy men with angry eyes and blood that ran red. Covetous men who did not heed his warnings and were content to use him to slaughter innocents in the name of “justice.” 

How could Nahri consider herself anything close to what those men were? 

“Nahri, I mean you no harm. I care not that you...” he swallowed, “commanded me. I am not angry with you. I am only upset that you… that you saw me in such a state.”

Nahri straightened up and took another swig of the waterskin. Her eyes were distant beneath furrowed brows. “Do you want me to be the scourge?”

Dara recognized his own words being spoken back to him and couldn’t help but recoil. He had been angry - so angry in that moment. The Qahtanis _again_ trying to ruin his life, creating a monster out of him. He did not want to be that man. He did not want to destroy or murder or devastate anymore. Dara was so tired. So tired of ruining everything he touched. Of never being able to stop running. Of chasing people away and ending up alone. Alone with nothing but the weight of his sins and nightmares to keep him company.

“I… what I said was senseless. I was enraged at the thought of-“ his voice broke. Dara shut his eyes fighting off the tears that threatened to brim over. He inhaled deeply through his nose before he looked at her again. “I was _afraid._ I thought that I had lost you… I still think I may have.”

“Dara…”

“What I did… what you saw… Banu Nahida, I _am_ that man. I did… horrible things to your people - the shafit,” he clarified. “I was young and naive. I thought what I was doing was right. And the Qahtanis were ruthless in their occupation. Terrifying the Daeva. Sacking their towns and neglecting them to ‘maintain order.’” 

The words were bitter on Dara’s tongue. Memories of merciless attacks by the Qahtanis and himself alike rearing their ugly heads. Neither side was right or just in their attacks, but if there _was_ a side that was more guilty… Dara knew it was his. He’d had twenty years to reflect when he’d resurfaced from slavery. Twenty years to see the shafit existed and Suleiman’s wrath hadn’t returned. Twenty years of carrying this guilt and regret upon his back.

He had been wrong. _They_ had been wrong. 

And then he’d met Nahri. A shafit girl who was a liar and a thief and the kindest person he had ever encountered. Even with her barbed tongue and her clever smile she was good to him _and_ a shafit. At first glance, Nahri had been the embodiment of everything the Nahids had told Dara that shafit were. Shifty and foul and soulless. But there was more to her than that. She was smart, pragmatic and strong in more ways than he was. Dara wondered just how many shafit he had slain that were the same in character. Good and kind and frightened. 

“Dara,” Nahri said, her voice bringing him back. “Do you _want_ to be the Scourge?”

“No,” he said, his voice hoarse. “No, Banu Nahida. I do not.”

“I don’t want you to be either,” said Nahri softly. “I… I want you to be the man who traveled with me to Daevabad. Who broke tradition in the Grand Temple and took my hand in secret. The man who would’ve accepted my proposal that evening. Give me that man and… and you shall not lose me, Afshin.”

Her request was so simple and so appealing. He wanted to be that man for her. By the most high, he wanted to try.

But the sad fact was, Dara was haunted by his past. It followed him, was a part of him and the moment he stopped reminding himself of what he had done, his retribution would be lost. His guilt was all he had to punish himself with now. He had to be honest with her.

“I want more than anything to be that man for you. The man that you deserve. But you know what I am, you know what I have done.”

“I’m willing to bet there is more to your story, Darayavahoush and I am willing to learn - to hear, to _help_ ,” she said, voice firm with intent. “You are not hopeless. You know that deep down, I am certain.”

He certainly did. He hoped that he wasn’t a lost cause. And she was offering to help him discover as much.

“Nahri, I know not what I’ve done to deserve your generosity,” he said. He had no idea what he should say, so he simply spoke his mind. 

Nahri offered a half-smile. “You made a flying carpet from a ship’s banner and took me to the night sky for safety. You burned through so much magic that you fell unconscious.”

“But Nahri, that was your wish, not _me_ ,” Dara corrected, his hand pressing to his collar. “I only did as you bid me.”

Nahri shrugged. “You are more than what you seem. I can see it even if you cannot. You _can_ be a good man.”

He snorted involuntarily. “How?”

“I don’t know, but I will help you discover that. We can travel the world, find a purpose, a cause that eases your burden.”

“Traveling the world with you would be enough,” Dara murmured. “That would ease my burden but it would not be retribution.”

“Then seek happiness and forgiveness instead. Let us find those who need healing or protection and do some good. Even it means relief and not retribution.”

She took his hand in her’s, fingers squeezing his knuckles tightly. “Dara, I meant what I said that night. I want to be with you. _You_ , not who you were.”

“And you think I can return to that man? From what I did to you, to everyone just two days ago?”

“I am willing to wait if it means that you get there.”

“Nahri,” Dara said solemnly. He knew these next words would make or break this opportunity. “If you choose me, you will never have children. I will not grow old with you. I can marry you but it will be seen as inappropriate. Is that a life you want?”

Nahri exhaled. “I’m still figuring out what I want but… I know that I want to see more of the world… that I want to help people - to _heal_ people.” Nahri paused, meeting his gaze. “I know that I want to be with you.”

Dara felt as though his heart skipped a beat, his stomach fluttered. She still wanted to be with him? After what she’d seen he was capable of? After confessing all that he _couldn’t_ give her? There was a lump in his throat but it wasn’t exactly bad and frankly, he was embarrassed by how much of a lovesick boy he felt. 

“You - you want to be with me?”

“Yes, I do but…” Nahri said, shaking her head. “It’s going to take some time for me to get back to where we were. Dara, too much has happened for me not to have to re-evaluate my feelings.”

He offered a sheepish smile. “Would that I have said yes to you that night in the Grand Temple, little thief.”

Nahri let out a laugh that was both sad and amused. “Indeed.”

Dara’s heart was between soaring and aching. He meant it. He should’ve accepted her proposal. Not being alive be damned. The simple fact of the matter was that Nahri made Dara a better person. She made him someone who looked after others. Someone who thought with their heart and head and not a misguided sense of duty. He would prove to her he was still that man. That the person she saw wreak havoc and destruction on that boat was no longer. He would bury that monster.

“Afshin,” Nahri said, the corner of her lip quirking up at his hopeful expression. “Not all is lost. Perhaps I’ll ask again some day.”

It took a great amount of willpower not to cry in that moment. Dara had never known someone so forgiving. He had never thought he’d find someone willing to overlook his transgressions and get to know him. Hear _his_ story. What he had done fourteen hundred years ago was horrible - inexcusable. But young Darayavahoush e-Afshin hadn’t stood a chance. The moment the Nahids told him what a marvel he was he had been bewitched and brainwashed and manipulated. 

Well now he _did_ stand a chance, and he would be damned if he let it get away from him again.

“And I will have the right answer next time,” he said. “I swear it, my thief.”

His Banu Nahida flashed him that smile that made him weak. “I’m counting on it.”

**Author's Note:**

> Honestly, I can’t really think of any continuations here so for now consider this a stand alone one shot


End file.
